Obsolete, 2016Gouache on paper, each 20" x 20" matted

Obsolete is a series of portraits of obsolete Macintosh computers and scavenger birds, painted in a style reminiscent of Renaissance drawings.

David Carr, speaking about the ruins of the city of Detroit in an article in the NYTimes wrote, “In sum, those man-made forces have perforated this place more deeply than any natural disaster could have.” This work explores a similar thought, asking questions about the causes of destruction and devastation, and blurring the lines between man-made and natural disasters

Ruination, 2015Archival Pigment Prints, 17"x12"

The series of prints, Ruination, references representations of ruins in the Romantic tradition, and taps into our timeless fascination with crumbling civilizations. The prints re-imagine images of recent disasters, suggesting a future in which the sites are given back to nature as wildlife preserves. Each of the sites sit on a continuum between man-made and natural disasters: from the catastrophic loss of life in the collapse of a garment factory in Bangladesh, to the devastation following the breached levies during Hurricane Katrina. Through a painstaking process of rendering the destruction line by line and then rebuilding a space of renewal atop the devastation, the works become not only intimate memorials but also personal acts of catharsis. Although the new images suggest a kind of romantic re-birth, closer inspection reveals new potential for destruction on a scale less striking to the human eye; a destruction perpetrated by nature on itself.